The Dudleys of Northamptionshire

For
a little more than a century after the Restoration of the
'Merry Monarch,' few families held a higher
position in 'the land of spires and squires' than the Dudleys, baronets
and lords of the manor of Clapton, near Thrapston, in the above-mentioned
county. During the Civil Wars they had espoused the cause of royalty, and
had shown their zeal by parting with much of their plate and jewels, in
order to supply the personal wants of the unfortunate Charles, and, when
his son came to the throne, they were among the favored ones who were not
forgotten. The young king entered London in triumph at the close of May,
1660, and the patent of baronetcy bestowed on William Dudley, Esquire, of
Clapton, in the county of Northampton, bears
date the 1st of August following. Sir William
was the lineal descendant of the Suttons, one of whom had taken, as was
usual, or at all events common, in such cases, the surname of Dudley on
his marriage with Margaret de Somerie, the
daughter and heiress of John de Somerie, by his wife, Hawise
Pagnell, whose ancestors were Lords of Dudley at
a date very soon after the Norman Conquest. Sir William had three Rives;
but he had children only by his third lady, a daughter of Sir Paul Pindar,
Alderman of London, whose mansion still partly stands-though on its last
legs in Bishopsgate Street Without. His son, the
second baronet, was for many years member of parliament for his native
county, and a Commissioner of the Customs; and as his grandson, another
Sir William, proved to be the last of his line, the title expired with him
in 1764.Among the ancestress
of this Sir William Dudley, one deserves special mention for her personal
bravery. Her name was Agnes Hotot, heiress of an ancient and noble family
of that name, who claimed to have come over to England with the Conqueror,
though their name does not figure on the roll of Battle Abbey. She was
certainly no unworthy daughter of a noble house, and she deserves being
held in memory for one deed of gallantry, which stands recorded in a
contemporary manuscript penned by a reverend monk, who was vicar of
Clapton during the reign of Henry
VII. The account runs as follows, the spelling
of the manuscript being modernized 'The father of Agnes
Hotot, the great heiress who married Dudley, having a dispute with one
Ringsdale about the title to a piece of land, they -the litigants-resolved to meet on the disputed ground, and to decide the affair by
single combat. On the day appointed for the encounter at the lists it so
happened that Sir John Hotot was laid up with the gout; but his daughter
Agnes, rather than that the land should be lost by default, armed herself
cap-à-pie,
and, mounting her father's horse, went and encountered Ringsdale, whom she
unhorsed after a stubborn contest. When he lay prostrate on the ground,
she loosened her throat-latch, lifted up the vizorof her helmet, and let her hair down
about her shoulders, thus discovering her sex.'It may be supposed that
Ringsdale was somewhat crestfallen on finding
that he had been fairly vanquished in the lists by a woman; and it is to
be hoped that he carried his quarrel no further. Doubtless, there was no
lack of suitors for the band of this brave heroine; but, whether they were
few or many, she married one of the Dudleys,
from whom Sir William was directly descended in the fourth or fifth
generation.One memorial of the
gallant deed of the fair Agnes survived, at all events as long as the male
line of the Dudleys held the broad lands of
Clapton; for they bore for their crest, as the heralds express it,
'On an eastern crown, or, a woman's head with a
helmet thereon, hair dishevelled, throat-latch
loosed, all proper.* Certainly the
symbolism of heraldry is sometimes very appropriate and eloquent; and if
there are any Dudleys still existing, whether
within orwithout the border of
Northamptonshire, it is possible that they claim the right of bearing that
crest as one of which they may well feel proud. I am told by the
present rector of Clapton that the last Sir William Dudley died at York in
1764, but in what churchyard he
was brazed is now unknown. The old church of Clapton has been pulled down
and rebuilt, and all that now records the family is a pair of tablets
almost illegible, though on one of them can be deciphered the words: 'Reliquiae
Ed. Dudley, armigeri; obiit Maii
6, 1632, ætatis suæ
72.' Clapton Manor (or Hall, as it is now called) is probably a wing of a
much larger building, and it still stands in park-like grounds. There is a
tradition in Clapton that the lofty spire of the old church was struck by
lightning, but that the Dudley of the day, instead of repairing it, pulled
it and the tower also entirely down, and built two farm-houses with the
stones, selling the bolls to pay his gambling debts.It only remains to add that some years prior to the death of the
last of the Dudleys, theestate was sold to Sir
Hutchins Williams, Bart. a cousin of the ancestor of the present squire
the lord of the manor and patron of Clapton Mr.
Augustus Peere Williams-Freeman.

* According to another account the arms are a chevron, or, between
three lions' heads erased, arg.-'The Visitations of Northamptonshire,' Harl.
MSS., 1553, fol. 188

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